Customer Reviews

Here, There & Everywhere

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4 star:		(3)
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2 star:		(1)
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Here, There and Everywhere isn't your typical time travel story. No, not by a long shot. Roxanne Bonaventure, with the aid of a mysterious device she calls 'the Sofia', travels backward and forward in time, visits parallel realities and chats with amazing and interesting people. Chris Roberson takes the well-worn premise of time-travel and quite litterally, turns it on it's ear. He has obviously done his homework on the subject. He structures the elements of theoretical time travel and uses them in a very real and dramatic way. This work really stretched the boundries of my understanding of the subject and yet it never reads like a text book although sometimes, the ideas take some time to wrap your brain around. Roxanne is a real, thinking, feeling, breathing human being. Her reactions to circumstances are authentically written and completely believable. She is fun and witty, sly and very intelligent. Though through all the myriad realities she visits, she finds herself more alone than before the Sofia came into her life. This element is the heart of the story. Her yearning for someone to share all this with is, at times, heartbreaking but never falls into melodramatic fluff. It's all very real. A 'What if...' in the best and truest sense.
What I also enjoyed were the pop-culture references that Roberson sprinkles through the story. From H.G. Wells to the Beatles. Great fun. I found myself wishing for a very long rainy day to just sit and read, although I also found myself wanting to savor it while it lasted.
Finally, after reading the last page of Here, There and Everywhere I found myself feeling as if I had just finished a sumptuous meal. Every course included new tastes and new textures. Every succulent morsel filling the tiniest corners. Roberson leaves no dangling plot points and his finale is like a glass of fine wine that finishes an incredible meal. One just sits back and says, 'Now, that was great'. Highly recommended.

The concept here isn't particularly new, as the author acknowledges with references to both "By His Bootstraps" and "The Man Who Folded Himself." But Roberson manages to find something rather new to say. Not only does he knock most time-travel SF into a cocked hat, by way of modern physics, but his take on the nature of time and the universe is particularly satisfying.

Roxanne Bonaventure is unique in the cosmos, the sole possessor of a 5-dimensional magic bracelet that allows her to move as she will in space, time and probability. The story follows her from the age of 11, when she is granted this "blessing", through the long years of her life. In the vignettes that comprise the novel, we see her learn and change, observing humanity in all its choices, until she finally finds out that what she really wants is the one thing she cannot have.

But sometimes you get what you need.

Although billed as a novel, the adventures of Roxanne Bonaventure come across as a series of connected short stories. In other words, it's very episodic, and for me this mix just didn't gel as a complete work. Several of the episodes were great (the intro involving the Beatles was nicely done), but others were less so (especially Sandford Blank and the Adventure of the Missing Scientist, yawn).

And in the end I was also troubled by the fact that my empathy for the main character had dissipated. The earlier sections, when she is young, worked well, making Roxanne a fairly believable character. But as the books goes on, and Roxanne just flits about it in time, eventually you come to wonder what is the point of it all. There seems to be no point, except to have some adventures. And that again gets back to the episodic structure and the feeling that it lacks coherence.

Feisty female's timefaring dimensional adventures.

Roberson cites Moorcock as one of his influences, among others, and this is reasonably clear, and as he mentions, it is definitey more Second Ether than Jerry Cornelius. The family relations in the Bonaventure brood are certainly pretty normative compared to the Cornelius clan, as long as your normative sort of family is more Buckaroo Banzai than leave it to beaver.

Chris Roberson is part of a certain cabal of science fiction authors that allegedly haunt Central Texas, plotting all manner of mischief and nefarious deeds, or so I am told. I mean, Austin's a comparatively small town, and I'm regularly running into the likes of Kinky Friedman, Ernest Hemingway, and Honore de Balzac, and don't think I haven't resorted to fisticuffs to settle certain sensitive affairs, but I'm pretty certain that I've never encounterd Mr. Roberson and his ilk. But I digress.

This present volume is a repackaging of, and expansion upon, "Any Time At All", the previous collection of the escapades of Roxanne Bonaventure, whose tales have been under development for several years. As a young girl, Roxanne comes into possession of a strange bracelet that allows her to travel through time and space, giving her access to all types of variant Earths both past and future, although she soon discovers that she can never change her native timeline's past. (As with most time travel fiction, considering the physics and implications and rules of rattling across time/space is headache-inducing here, so best not to think too deeply upon the mechanics, although there is one particular precept here that is critical to the novel's primary plot point.)

Naturally, she embarks upon amusing escapades throughout history, including a mandatory brush with the Nazis, because if you can go to the past, battling these evildoers is pretty much de rigeur. She also pops back to Victorian London to assist one Sandford Blank (a fictional melange of Sherlock Holmes and Sexton Blake), a character who will be featured on his own in one of the prolific Mr. Roberson's forthcoming novels.

It should be noted that the author credits several influences, among them Philip Jose Farmer's Wold Newton Universe (a postulation that many of the Victorian and Pulp Era heroes are all related), in emulation of which Mr. Roberson has created a whole clan of Bonaventures who've had rollicking adventures of their own in separate novels. He also gives a nod to Jess Nevins' comprehensive if daunting "Encylopedia of Fantastic Victoriana", which is definitely worth picking up for fans of that genre, or followers of Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentleman.

I also feel compelled to mention that Mr. Roberson is the grand poobah of MonkeyBrain Books, a genre publisher with some excellent titles.

"Here, There & Everywhere" is episodic in nature and doesn't necessarily break any new ground in the time travel genre, but I'm a fan of cross-pollination with historical figures and other literary characters, and so I give it higher marks than I might otherwise. Also, the cover art by John Picacio is great. (He has done most, if not all, of the covers for the works of the aforementioned cabal of authors.)

Oh, fans of Doctor Who will probably find an extra dimension in this novel.

This book is a lot of fun to read. Roberson never lets the grass grow under his likeable heroine, Roxanne Bonaventure, as she jumps around not only in time but across realities. There is a lot of sly humor throughout and there are moments that acheive a nice emotional resonance as she deals with her father's illness and her own loneliness.

A few minor complaints. It felt a little rushed. The book is bursting at the seams with ideas, but frequently they are glossed over. Decades of subjective time are covered in pages. This book could have easily been twice as long without losing any of its momentum.

It also doesn't help that many scenes take place off stage. Again - I wanted to know more about what Roxanne was doing.

All in all, though, I highly recommend this novel and I am looking forward to reading more from this author.

In a blinding light 11 year old Roxanne life is forever changed by an old woman who is dying and gives her an amazing braclet.
But this isn't just any braclet. This braclet allows Roxanne not just to travel through time but through alternative realities.
Roxanne journey is a lonely one for there is a price for wearing the braclet. As she grows and learns how to use the braclet you will be taken on a journey that you will not soon forget.
Mr Roberson doesn't bog us down with complicated explaination of how things work though he does do his homework on time travel and alternative realities(or should I say the theory of time travel and alternative realities). He is more concerned with Roxanne's growth and how the this bracelt effects her. Roxanne is a person I surely love to meet. She is smart, funny and above courious about everything.
A few years ago I had the extreme pleasure reading(and meeting Chris) the self published version of this book by Mr. Roberson called Any Time At All which was a great read. I have to say this expanded version was an even more of a pleasure to read.
If you love time travel stories this book is for you. But this isn't the usual kind of time travel book. Chris Roberson writes an extemely wonderful tale of a person journey through life as she walks a solitary road though time.
This is a book you should take time to read.

I loved this book. Thought this was the best Sci-Fi novel I have ever read about time travel. The book throughout is excellent and the very ending puts it completely over the top wrapping up everything in the book. I will warn you that most other people I've recommended this book liked it a lot but didn't love it as much as I did-not sure why. May have been because the main character is female or they just weren't impressed with how the time traveling was handled. But again, as far as time traveling, best Sci-Fi novel I have ever read.

This novel deserves a wider audience. Here, There & Everywhere is a light-hearted romp that also examines deeper issues like mortality and loneliness. Roxanne Bonaventure is an ultra-cool heroine--in both poise and demeanor--which makes the novel a lightning-fast read.

The novel has non-stop thrills and adventure, and a gleefully wicked take on time travel heroes of the past and present. What more could you ask for?

I'm definitely a time-travel novels fan and "Here, There and Everywhere" (2005) is a real treat for genre lovers!
The present book is a re-elaboration and expansion of a previous shorter version "Any Time At All (2002).
Mr. Robeson is a very promising Texan sci-fi author, I look ahead to read more from his pen!

Each chapter of this book uses a very fitting Beatles' song name as title.
The story hooks me from the very beginning with the recreation of an alternate re-launching of The Beatles.
The main character is Roxanne Bonaventure a brilliant girl that is mysteriously gifted with a bracelet that allows her to jump in time and into alternate universes.
Each episode follows Roxanne growing up and experiencing with her gift, exploring time and alternative universes. She meets historical characters as H. G. Wells and John Dee as well as a plethora of fictional ones.
She jumps into the future and to the Victorian era, the Elizabethan era, Pharaoh's Egypt and London in the `30s and `50s.
The chapter "This Boy", made me remembers the film "Groundhog Day" with 19 years old Roxanne trying to appeal Nigel.
"Nowhere Man" is a delicious encounter with investigator Sanford Blank, supposedly the model for Sherlock Holmes.

Mr. Robeson shows he has advantageous read serious authors on matters as hyperspace, black holes and time travel to give veracity to his novel.

It is a gripping and thought provoking book. Time-travelers do not let this trip pass you by unnoticed!

Reviewed by Max Yofre.